Karma is a new system in Risk of Rain 2 that makes the Mithrix fight harder when your run gets too strong. The patch notes only say that Karma makes the final fight on the moon much harder, so we have covered how to get Karma, how to turn it off, or why Mithrix suddenly kills you in seconds, stay with us.
In This Guide:
What Is Karma in Risk of Rain 2?
Karma is an optional difficulty system. The more power you gain in a run, the higher your Karma goes, and the harder Mithrix gets. You ask why? To stop super strong builds from melting the final boss.
Karma has 8 levels. It’s part of the free base-game update. You don’t need Hallowed Concepts to use it, but some ways to gain Karma need DLC content. Also it’s worth noting that Karma can’t go down during a run.
List of All Risk of Rain 2 Karma Triggers
Most triggers give +1 Karma and work once per run. The repeatable ones are marked in the table. The only exception is False Son, which gives +2.
| Trigger | Karma | Repeatable? | DLC needed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hold 3 Lunar items | +1 | No | None |
| Hold 3 Meal items | +1 | No | Alloyed Collective |
| Hold 5 Hallowed items | +1 | No | Hallowed Concepts |
| Have 50 items (Hexes, used items, and temporary items don’t count) | +1 | No | None |
| Pick up an Elite Aspect | +1 | No | None |
| Pick up Beads of Fealty | +1 | No | None |
| Loop back to earlier stages | +1 | Yes | None |
| Enter Void Fields | +1 | No | None |
| Complete Void Fields | +1 | No | None |
| Complete Bulwark’s Ambry | +1 | Yes | None |
| Enter A Moment, Fractured | +1 | Yes | None |
| Get kicked out of the Bazaar Between Time | +1 | Yes | None |
| Get kicked out of the Computational Exchange | +1 | No | Alloyed Collective |
| Complete a Halcyon Shrine | +1 | Yes | Seekers of the Storm |
| Kill a teleporter boss before the teleporter reaches 10% (Trophy Hunter’s Tricorn cancels this) | +1 | No | None |
| Complete a Shrine of Descent event | +1 | Yes | Hallowed Concepts |
| Kill the Elite Elder Lemurians in Abandoned Aqueduct | +1 | Yes | None |
| Open the Legendary (gold) Chest on Stage 4 | +1 | No | None |
| Beat Alloy Worship Unit | +1 | Yes | None |
| Beat Aurelionite | +1 | No | None |
| Beat False Son | +2 | No | Seekers of the Storm |
| Beat Solus Wing | +1 | No | Alloyed Collective |
| Beat Solus Heart | +1 | No | Alloyed Collective |
| Beat Anima Harvester | +1 | No | Hallowed Concepts |
| Beat the hidden Hallowed Concepts boss (spoiler, so no name here) | +1 | No | Hallowed Concepts |
Important: Lunar items are a threshold, not a per-item reward. Holding 3 Lunar items gives +1 Karma, not +3. Picking up 3 more won’t give another point.
How to Turn Karma Off in Risk of Rain 2
In normal runs, Karma is optional. You can turn it on or off in the lobby before you start, in a new section below the Artifacts on the right side. Turn it off and Mithrix stays the same as before. Eclipse is different, as you’ll see below.
Karma on Eclipse
Karma is forced on in Eclipse and starts at your Eclipse level. So Eclipse 8 starts at Karma 8, even if you never unlocked it. This isn’t in the patch notes.
It’s also not tied to the DLC. Players without Hallowed Concepts say Karma still hits them, and turning off the expansion in the lobby doesn’t remove it.
A lot of Eclipse players are unhappy about this. They say it makes all the older Eclipse clears feel pointless, and that even a strong build can lose to Mithrix. The most common asks are a toggle, or a start at Karma 0, since Karma is meant to punish extra power and starting at 8 skips that idea.
A new mod on Thunderstore called DisableKarma does exactly this. It lets you pick any Karma level from 0 to 8 on Eclipse and starts at 0 by default. Its page says it may need updates after game patches, and as always, use mods at your own risk.
What Karma Does to Mithrix
Here are the things you should expect from Mithrix:
- Mithrix is faster, flies around the arena, and uses new attacks. The dev preview showed a floating throne, Lunar Chimeras, and hammer attacks with explosive spikes.
- He gets an armor phase where everything does about 1 damage for a short time, even in phase 4.
- In phase 4, healing wisps heal him for a part of his max health. On Eclipse they come more often. If you can’t kill them fast, the fight can feel impossible.
- Strong runs still lose. Players’ experiences are really scary and disappointing. One Loader player one-shot almost everything until Mithrix, then died fast. Another player’s 15-stage False Son run almost failed.
That’s everything we know about Karma so far. Have you beaten Karma 8 Mithrix yet? Tell me in the comments below!
Risk of Rain 2
